CKN Driver Diary: Kevin King @ Martensville Speedway

After a good weekend in Mosport helping out the PSL team drivers in the Eastern Canadian Karting Championship, I was already flying out to Regina for some testing. I tested engines all day on Monday, and then on Tuesday we were off to Saskatoon for the third and fourth rounds of the Western Canadian Championship. I knew I couldn’t make any errors or have a DNF because I had already taken my drop for the championship. The first day was all about learning the track, which we thought went pretty well, but soon afterwards when we started testing and trying to find good setups, we were disappointed at being just over one second off!

FRIDAY

I kept my head up, because I knew I was able to win the championship and couldn’t screw this all up. With renewed motivation on a brand new day, we started testing more seriously and finally decided to change to a back-up chassis. Then we were on top of the charts for timed practice. My PSL/CRG with PSL Power was right-on all afternoon and topping the charts.

Photo Courtesy: Kevin King

SATURDAY

It was a hot and sunny day and I was confident for qualifying after being fast all day on Friday, but catastrophe came in qualifying when the chain broke on the second lap! I was dissapointed, qualified P12, and was not getting good feedback from the kart. But I still kept my head up. In the Prefinal, I was getting good lap times and the PSL/CRG package was just amazing as I moved back to fifth while still saving the tires. The track was really hard on the tires and I knew I needed to be conservative. In the Final everything went well. I couldn’t make any mistakes because I knew I couldn’t have another DNF and I managed to finish on the podium in third.

SUNDAY

The second race day was also a hot and sunny day. Sunday’s warm-up session was really good and I ended up P1 with some good testing. The qualifying session was really tight, and I was P1 for a long time before Bryce pulled a good time to outqualify me by less than a tenth! Starting in P2 for the Prefinal, I probably had the best start of the weekend. Having a good run, I came out of the first corner in first place and managed to keep it there until lap 10 out of 15 when Bryce passed me. It was a really good race. In the Final, I tried to have the same start as the Prefinal, but Bryce didn’t do the same error and I fell back to P5 at the start. I moved back up to third place, and was catching the first two drivers quickly at two-tenths per lap, but it wasn’t enough to get second.  I needed one more lap.

Through two rounds now I am second place in the championship and am in good contention to race for the championship win. The next race in Calgary is going to be very tight, since the top three in the championship are very close. A big thanks to the whole CRG West team and to PSL karting for giving me a really good chassis and engine to compete with.